Now that the actual sales numbers are available it is clear that the strong sales decline of nearly 22% in comics and 16.5% in graphic novels in year-over-year sales in January 2011 is due in part to a lack of big titles in both sales categories.  While the comic book side can boast one strong release, the death-aided Fantastic Four #587, it was the only title over 100,000 and the #2 book in January sold under 73,000 (there were 8 titles over 73K in January of 2010).  Plus a number of DC’s heavy hitters including Batman Inc., The Dark Knight, Flash, and Green Lantern didn’t ship, which hurt both the overall sales and DC’s market share in particular.

Another factor that should be taken into consideration is the fact that Diamond didn’t ship during the final week of December 2009, which pushed some titles into the new year and aided January 2010 sales, which also made it more difficult to duplicate January 2010’s sales in the first month of 2011.
 
On the graphic novel side the lack of potent titles was even more pronounced.  The #1 book, Jack of Fables Vol. 8 posted the lowest number for a chart topper since ICv2 began charting sales back in 2001.  Jack of Fables Vol. 8 sold 14% fewer copies than Vol.7, which was released in June of 2010. But it should also be noted that Jack of Fables Vol. 7 was only the 9th bestselling book in June of 2010. It has been suggested that the number of releases in January was down and that is the reason for the decline in monthly sales, but in a hit-driven business, it’s not just the number of titles released that counts, it’s also the popularity of those titles.
 
For an overview and analysis of comic sales in January, see "'Fantastic Four' #587 Dominates January Sales."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during January, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--January 2011."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels shipped during January, see "Top 300 Graphic Novels Actual--January 2011."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during December, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--December 2010."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels shipped during December, see "Top 300 Graphic Novels Actual--December 2010."


For an overview and analysis of the best-selling comics and graphic novels in December, see "'Batman: The Dark Knight' Tops December."  For an analysis of the dollar trends in December, see "December Comic Sales Down."

For our index to our reports on the top comic and graphic novel preorders for January 2000 through January 2011, see "ICv2's Top 300 Comics and Top 300 GNs Index."